As a reproducing element of HDD (Hard Disk Drive) or the like, a magnetoresistive effect element is used. In HDD, a reduction of noise is required in addition to an improvement of reproducing resolution in order to improve recording density. For this purpose, a multi-magnetic head (multi-reproducing head) which is one magnetic head having a plurality of magnetoresistive effect elements mounted thereon has been investigated.
Such a multi-magnetic head makes it possible to integrate the same signal to be reproduced a plurality of times, thereby enabling a reduction of a white noise component. As a result, a high SNR (Signal Noise Ratio) is obtained, which makes it possible to improve the recording density.
Here, there is a possibility that the multi-magnetic head gets off-track due to skew. Specifically, when the magnetic head has an angle to a track, there is a possibility that one of the pair of the magnetoresistive effect elements deviates from a reproduction target track. This makes the reduction of the white noise difficult.
Accordingly, it is necessary to narrow an interval between the magnetoresistive effect elements so that the pair of magnetoresistive effect elements are on the same track even when the magnetic head has skew. Under such circumstances, thinning a magnetic shield electrode between the magnetoresistive effect elements has been investigated.
However, thinning the magnetic shield electrode leads to a deterioration of its shielding performance, making the magnetoresistive effect elements susceptible to an influence of external noise.